


Not The Ideal Situation

by NeonCityLights



Category: Young Justice (Cartoon)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-10
Updated: 2017-01-10
Packaged: 2018-09-16 14:09:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 804
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9275447
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NeonCityLights/pseuds/NeonCityLights
Summary: My own take on an eventual confrontation if Bart took a much more stealthier approach upon returning to the past.





	

Bart was a mystery. There was a story behind every odd gesture, strange utterance, and looks of amazement at the most common things. Everything was tucked behind a mask of deceit that the boy always wore. Every lie, falsehood, and poor excuse he used to brush of Jaime’s concern like it was nothing was intricately woven to conceal the truth beneath.

When it dawned on Jaime that the speedster wasn’t the person he said he was, it stung. Bart was a stranger, and not like in ‘you-don’t-really-know-that-much-about-your-friend’ way. It hurt, it scared him, it made him angry to think that the one person he trusted most in the world was a mole, a spy.

The League had the issue before, why couldn’t it happen again?

“You’re not Flash’s nephew,” Jaime had said, venom lacing every word. He watched as the speedster, who expressed unbridled energy in a dozen little movements even when standing still, freeze up like a deer in the head lights.

They were alone, in the desert outside of El Paso, and Bart just stood there like a mannequin. There was no cause for concern etched in his face, no exasperated excuse or hint of confusion. He was still. The gears of thought behind those emerald jewels of the Allen line stalled out.

Tears burned at the back of Jaime’s eyes, and he tried his hardest to blink them away. The silence from Bart broke the tension hanging over his head all day, like some unforgiving storm cloud drowning the earth in a torrent of rain.

He felt his suit, the scarab’s armor, retract off his body. The exhaustion from the patrol earlier that night was forgotten. There was no turning back. So, under the light of the full moon with the desert’s chill nipping at his skin like a pack of hungry coyotes, Jaime barred his heart and soul.

“Blue,” Bart said, taking in a deep breath. He didn’t know where to begin, how to back out of this, if he even could. There was no telling how much Jaime really knew, and what he convinced himself to be the truth. “I was-I mean-”

“No,” Jaime said, voice breaking. Tears flowed down his cheeks in steady, warm trickles. A double-edged dagger of distrust stabbed into both of their hearts. “You lied to me. I thought we were friends, I thought we were close, _Hermano_. We fought at each other’s side for how long? Hell, I brought you to my house, to my family!”

Dread, honest dread, punched Bart in the gut. This was inevitable. He understood it the moment he stepped into that time machine, the moment he came to Barry in confidence, the moment he was proudly presented by his grandfather to the team under Nightwings suspicious gaze. Someone was going to find out he was a piece of the puzzle that didn’t belong.

He was so careful too, studied and practiced every hour he could while not under the watchful eye of others. There were slip ups, of course. Unavoidable, but shoved him forward to the moment of truth, be it with the rest of the League or the senior members of the team.

He just didn’t want it to be Jaime.

“Please-” Bart tried, but Jaime wasn’t even looking at him. He watched as his friend paced before him on top of the sand dune, whipping tears from his puffy eyes. His cheeks were red, and his face scrunched up in unbelievable, emotional torment.

It was all unraveling right before Bart’s very eyes.

“Why?” Jaime chocked out. He didn’t plan for things to go like this. Heck, he didn’t know what would happen after this confrontation. There was no plan for the future, not in their line of work. Hours ago, this felt like a test of the imagination, a possibility that he would never reach. But now, it was too real, it hurt too much to be any different.

Bart bit his bottom lip. He knew whatever words he chose wouldn’t hold a semblance of comfort to his friend’s ears, if he even believed them. So, he spoke the truth, but there was no way to avoid the brutality.

“I was sent back, from the future, to kill you.”

Jaime stopped, and looked at him with wide eyes.

“That little voice in the back of your head-”

Jaime was suddenly away of his own little secret, shouting of extermination and eradication at the top of its lungs. A little secret that whispered a thousand ways to kill his mother whenever she was stern with him. A little secret that tested his will during combat. In those moments, that come so suddenly, he has to use every ounce of his will to keep the scarab from blasting away his teammates, his friends.

“-turns you into a fucking monster.”


End file.
